By the time the ball drops on New Years Eve I will have watched close to 160 films for the first time.
Of those about 75 of them were released in 2025. I also rewatched about 30 movies, so we’re close to 200 films watched in 2025.
This does not fill me with a sense of accomplishment. It makes me think I should work on my emotional problems.
You know the old joke: A man will watch 200 movies rather than go to therapy.
To understand how this happened, we need to talk a little about my life.
First, I don’t drink and I don’t go to bars.
So, every other Friday, I would take a night off from my responsibilities as a husband and father. Our children are autistic and can’t be left with a babysitter. So my wife and I have lunch dates when the kids are in school but have no way to go out on a weekend date.
My wife is in plays and when she is in one she goes to rehearsals and gets to get away several nights a week. And I watch the kids at other times on weekends so she can recharge.
On my Friday nights off I would head to Indianapolis, about an hour away from where we live and go to the comic book store and then to a movie; preferably something in IMAX. Sometimes this year I went to a second movie in town late on Saturday or Sunday nights. The kinds of movies that weren’t playing in IMAX anyway.
My kids generally control the tv but I have an iPad and AirPods so if we weren’t going anywhere I might watch something on a streaming service while Finding Nemo, Encanto or Sesame Street played on the big screen.
I certainly watch television shows, and some sports. This movie watching thing is not a new phenomenon I have always watch a ton of movies, tv and read a bunch of comics and a few books each year.
Letterboxd changed my habits and made me more driven, I think, to see more new movies. I suspect that in past years I saw far fewer movies that were brand new. I have a sense that I saw whatever I was generally interested in and then the next year I tried to watch whatever got nominated for best picture at the Oscars.
In the past two or three years, because of Letterboxd and this blog I think I have tried to watch stuff I was interested in as it came out. Also, social media is going to give away huge parts of most movies within hours of release. Sometimes I’m just trying to stay ahead of that.
I generally say something about every movie I watch on Letterboxd. If I have a lot to say, I put it on here. The quality of the movie does not necessarily reflect whether or not I’ve got anything to say about it.
I think of all the movies I saw about trauma this year (and there were too many of them) that Train Dreams was the very best one. It’s in my top 10. And I don’t have a review for it and don’t think I will. It’s very good though, you should see it if you haven’t already.
Couple of other notes. I am not a professional critic. I can hear some of you now: “We’ve read your reviews. We know.”
Shut up.
Anyway, because I’m not a professional I don’t get screeners. I also don’t illegally download movies. So if something is not playing in Indianapolis between Jan 1 and Dec 31 or could be found on a streamer or rented digitally I had no way to watch it.
In November I made a list of movies that came out in 2025 that I wanted to see. This strategy was actually very successful. I like lists, and it helped me focus on the titles that I was still interested in. I started with somewhere like 45 movies and in the last week of the year I’m down to 10 or so movies that are really 2025 movies.
Some movies are only 2025 movies if you live in New York or Los Angelos. They will go nationwide during Oscar season in 2026 in hopes of making money in middle America.
Here are the ones on my list that haven’t played in town yet.
The Testament of Ann Lee, Sound of Falling, Resurrection and No Other Choice.
I am very interested in Park Chan Wok’s No Other Choice because I’ve found every movie of his that I have seen so far (Oldboy, Decision to Leave) to be extraordinary. I heard good things about Testament and will certainly check it out at some point. Sound of Falling and Resurrection don’t look like the kinds of movies I usually enjoy but you never know. (It’s that kind of thinking BTW that got me to 200 movies this year.)
Here are the ones I could have seen and in some cases could still see but it’s looking increasingly unlikely.
Good Fortune, Black Phone 2, Lone Samurai, If I Had Legs I’d Kick You, Nuremberg, The Running Man, Blue Moon, Ella McCay and Hamnet.
All of these can be watched right now. Currently, my plan is to see Hamnet on the 31st.
The others? Guess we will see. In some cases they are in that early rental period where they cost $20 to rent. I’m probably not doing that. In some cases my interest is not so strong that I can’t just wait for them to show up on a streaming service.
And there were certainly some of these where the reviews were so bad they dampened my interest. Hello, Ella McCay.
I was set to go to the Running Man this year and after the reviews came out I went to Sentimental Value instead. That was probably a mistake. Sentimental Value is very good for what it is. But what it is is another exploration of trauma and 2025 was full of those and most of them left me cold.
I think I would have had a better time watching Glen Powell crack one liners and kill bad guys.
In January, I will, of course, have a list of the best movies I watched in 2025.
This column was a way to clear the decks and clear my throat and explain why some movies won’t be on my list that might be on some others.
And the year is almost over and we’re still here.
Dark Highways 
Leave a comment